


Injuries

by sirnando



Category: Football RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-18
Updated: 2015-04-18
Packaged: 2018-03-23 14:40:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3772042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirnando/pseuds/sirnando
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes an injury for Cristiano to notice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Injuries

**Author's Note:**

> hi so this is the last one for the weekend probably

James was a nice guy. Really nice even. And Cristiano liked him. Never had any issues with him that caused him to roll his eyes or make rude faces. James was like a puppy (which Marcelo had read somewhere once and laughed aloud, but they all agreed). He was. You couldn’t hate him, it was proven to be impossible. Because if he spilled some water or ripped someone’s shirt or missed a shot, he’d smile sheepishly and mumble sorry and it was such a- specific smile that you couldn’t not forgive him. Sergio even had a theory that he’d be able to kill someone, but smile and have no one accuse him.

 

But overall he was nice, Cristiano claimed. A fantastic player too. But that’s where their friendship ended. They didn’t talk much, maybe yelled to one another sometimes across the field and celebrated together when either scored. Had small talk between games. But it was never a close thing, Cristiano had even forgotten he had James’ number saved in his phone.

 

So when James screwed his ankle up, Cristiano was disappointed. Of course because it was an immense part of their team missing. But everyone was disappointed, in a very natural way. Cristiano didn’t feel despair neither did he fall into depression. It’d be fine, the team would survive through it. Only a few days anyways.

 

And then he found out it was two months and he panicked.

 

The rest of the squad did too of course.

 

~

The first few games turned out fine. He didn’t want to sound rude or insensitive but Isco worked as well as James and many times Cristiano didn’t find himself “missing” per say, James’ own passes. It was all the same to him, whichever player passed and caused him to score goals, he could live with it.

 

He read papers that listed the cause of Real’s poor performance lately was James’ absence. But Cristiano never understood why they’d claim that. He didn’t find any issues? They were still winning, not everything relied on one midfielder.

 

Of course he never mentioned any of these thoughts to anyone, because everyone else seemed to undoubtedly agree with the headlines. But James was never the goal-scoring machine was he? He was the one with his name on the sheet almost every match, top goal scorer. The reason they weren’t floundering behind Barcelona too pathetically. James had never done that. He didn’t even have top assists.

 

Cristiano liked keeping his reputation up as well, so he never voiced those opinions either for fear that it would get ruined. Nevertheless he was bothered.

 

~

Since the fact that everyone was completely ignoring his capabilities, Cristiano tried harder. Ran faster, passed better, kicked harder. His lungs burned more than once after the matches, but it was a good burn. A nice feeling because he knew it was the cause of something he succeeded at. They couldn’t ignore him after, not when he scored more than ever before.

But they did. See Cristiano didn’t know if he was blind, but he didn’t see a lack of efficiency within the team. They were winning. Wasn’t that good enough? He was scoring, hello? There was nothing wrong with James being gone, why couldn’t they just let it go. (It might’ve been because he was only focused on his own performance, that had skimmed his mind, but only for a few seconds so he ignored it).

 

He only got praise from Sergio (who praised everyone) and Marcelo for evidently trying so hard, but Marcelo was his friend so that didn’t count. What counted was what they wrote. What they saw. And he wasn’t one to care about people’s opinion of course, but this mattered. Only this one time though.

 

~

The seventh game James missed was the first one they lost. It was only by a margin though, a bare loss so Cristiano didn’t pay mind to it. He’d scored twice anyways. Then they lost again. And Cristiano didn’t score, so panic pricked his mind for a second and then subsided. 

 

He’d do it next time, they were not in a hole. This was not happening.

 

And then they lost for a third time in a row, Cristiano wasn’t listed again. Now he panicked.

 

One or two games was fine but three games, three games was not ok. Not ok. 

 

He wouldn’t exactly label it as a failure already, but it was coming close. That’s also when he finally realized that maybe the headlines weren’t as pathetic as he had accused them to be before. The team wasn’t functioning pristinely. And although he wasn’t going to jump to conclusions and claim that it was all because James was gone, he pushed through his head (quite painfully) that maybe he did play a major role. Not to Cristiano’s individual success of course, but in a way.

 

Maybe having him back quickly was advisable.

 

~

 

The perfect conclusion would be that they climbed out of the three game hole; but they didn’t. They didn’t lose constantly but it was always preferable to win consistently instead of becoming bipolar with your results.

 

Cristiano also became bipolar. Sometimes he’d score and sometimes he wouldn’t, but one thing came for sure: his scoring efficiency wasn’t the same anymore. He didn’t know why. He’d either miss a pass or miss a shot, couldn’t read the directions the midfielders were thinking of. It became foreign, odd, scary even. And he couldn’t define why exactly, but something was missing in all those games. He had motivation, passion, the skill. All the things he had before so why all of a sudden…?

 

“It’ll come back.” Iker soothed. All droughts passed and all conflicts became resolved. It’d be ok.

 

But that was easy for Iker to say, someone who had experienced so much stress at the club that he had begun balding. And Cris had no desire of balding soon.

 

~

 

There’s nothing to describe after that, except for “bad”. Their morale went down, their points even lower. It was cringeworthy to watch.

 

No one ever wanted to say they were giving up, but in performance they were. Nobody at this point knew what had turned wrong, Ancelotti turned grayer than before.

 

And when the two months of hell finally came to a close, James returned. Marcelo joked that he should go back home and save himself. But James shook his head no and claimed it wouldn’t be too hard to fix it, all problems had solutions and then he smiled. And everyone (well most everyone) believed him. Because he’d smiled.

 

~

 

See Cristiano wasn’t a big fan of superstitions or “special” occurrences, he didn’t think there were supernatural forces which caused specific actions or events, so when James came back and Cristiano scored and they won the game, Cris didn’t take it as some “sign”. He was just thrilled the drought was over.

 

But then the next game they won again and Cristiano scored again.

 

And then the next.

 

And only then he decided that maybe all those miracles and symbols that his mom babbled about weren't so pathetic.

 

It was a slow decision. It didn't come all at once, but after a moment of heavy thinking Cristiano knit his eyebrows together tightly and it came to him. Technically he could've been an asshole still and decided that it was him all along, no one else had anything to do with it. But he didn't. 

 

"It was you." He mumbled to James after the game and James turned to him in surprise. It wasn't like Cristiano to talk freely.

 

"Sorry, what?" 

 

"It was you. You actually made a difference.”

 

It came out a little more rude than he planned out, but he didn't bother changing the intonation. Everyone knew he wasn't exactly overly sympathetic.

 

James reddened and shrugged. "I don't think so. I can't be the only one."

 

But Cristiano shook his head violently. "No. No it was." And he patted James on the shoulder before mumbling a good job like always and leaving.

 

James' redness didn't subside.

 

~

 

Cristiano didn't know what changed in him. Besides the game of course. Yeah James made a difference on the pitch and he scored goals because of him but there was something more.

 

He'd always had James around. Nothing of that had changed just the fact that he was gone for a little. But for some reason Cristiano felt something. Like relief or whatever. It couldn't be relief though because- because it couldn't. Why would he be relieved? It was just James.

 

But for some weird reason he found himself having the urge to talk to him more. He never acted upon it. Ever. He had his two close friends and he didn't need anyone else, he was fine on his own. Of course James was extremely nice and c- something else he couldn't describe. Just like. Cool. But not cool enough for Cristiano to stride on up and start up a conversation. People did that to him, not reversed.

 

He tried plugging the urge with different thoughts and laughs with Marcelo, but every single time some of it leaked out to the main part of his brain and he couldn't wash it back down.

 

Whatever. He was just injured it's not like he died and then got revived. It was stupid anyways.

 

~

 

"And then she left. It was nice while it lasted but I knew it wouldn't last anyways. Like maybe like, I could make it work out you know? But like mom wasn't a fan anyways so like it was a lost cause from the beginning. Ya feel?" 

 

Cristiano nodded along while stretching, his eyes focused on something. "Yeah she sounds great. I'm glad it's working out."

 

Sergio stopped stretching and stared. "Bro I like just told you it wasn't gonna happen?"

 

Cristiano looked to him suddenly. "Oh really? Sorry man."

 

"That- that was... I just spent like fifteen minutes explaining?" Sergio was flustered, his eyebrows knit together.

 

"Sorry. I was thinking about something."

 

Sergio smirked.

 

"What?"

 

"If you want to talk to him just do it man. He's a nice dude it's not like he'll shoot you down."

 

Cristiano was confused. "Who?"

 

"Um- James? You've been staring at him for like ever. If I didn't knew any better you were-"

 

Cristiano shot him a look of disgust. "Fuck off."

 

Sergio shrugged. "I'm just saying-"

 

"Fuck off I said. You're not saying anything." And he ran off to start his laps.

 

He didn't look at James again after that. It was a coincidence.

 

~

 

He scored again. Who assisted? James. At this point it wasn't a surprise anymore. If Cristiano scored a goal everyone waited to see how well James had passed that time. And if it wasn't him, they'd be sure to rub their eyes and make sure it wasn't a mistake.

 

James rarely got any gratitude from Cristiano. He wasn't surprised though, it had never happened before, so he was surprised when it actually came. And it came, about seven games into his return.

 

"It was amazing." Cristiano said to him after the game. James had turned around shirtless to address Cris politely.

 

"Thank you. Your goal was impressive as well."

 

"Well, I can't say it was bad."

 

James smiled sheepishly, unsure of how he was supposed to answer that. 

 

"But-" Cristiano retaliated. "Magicians don't happen without the magic. Or like... something along those lines. You get the point right?" James laughed and Cris grew nervous. What the fuck was that? It didn't even make sense he never made intellectual comparisons.

 

"I get it." He smiled again.

 

"Right." And he left before he could say anything else stupid. 

 

(Also James' chest was extremely- close.)

 

~

 

The next training Iker yelled at him. "If you want to talk then go there and talk. I didn't expect I'd have to teach you these types of things."

 

Cristiano tore his eyes away from the place (he still refused to admit it was him) and glared. "I can do whatever I want alright. You don't even know where I'm looking."

 

Iker and Sergio looked at one another and burst out laughing. "Yeah, sure." Sergio muttered and Cristiano ran away.

 

He ran into James but never stopped, all he heard was the other two chuckling behind him again.

 

~

 

He scored the next game but it was one of those rare moments that James hadn't passed.

 

It was disappointing, he concluded. He didn't know why he felt disappointed, maybe because he'd just gotten so used to having him assist.

 

Also James hadn't run over to him to celebrate since he was all the way on the other side of the field talking to Toni. But that wasn't it. It couldn't be. Why did it matter? (But he did sort of maybe like getting those hugs.)

 

~

 

"You didn't pass to me." He accused in the lockers after the game.

 

James turned around surprised again. Shirtless. Underwear. "Sorry. I tried I did I really wanted to. That's the only thing I was focused on." He tried smiling but Cristiano grew intimidating.

 

Cris exhaled loudly and stared at him soundless. James shuffled on his feet.

 

"I.... I really did-" he tried filling up the silence because it was starting to grow tense and Cris wouldn't stop staring but- 

 

"Fine."

 

And he stalked off, leaving James frozen still.

 

~

 

At training the next day the urge to apologize (as well as just talk to him) overcame him and he ran over to him during their laps.

 

"Sorry for being rude."

 

James was startled (again) to see him by his side. "Oh, it's fine."

 

"No but I was mean. But also mad. But not mad at you I just really love it when you pass to me." Love? What the fuck that was not a good word to use. "I mean. I mean it's odd if you're not the one passing." He was red already so he hoped the new shade wouldn't be too noticeable.

 

"Oh. I'm glad." James smiled to him as well as he could to show off his appreciation. He wanted to say more, had the urge to, but nothing else was able to roll off his tongue.

 

So they ran together in silence the rest of the way. And then did everything else together that day, but neither of them knew what to say.

 

~

 

James scored the game after. He was shocked (he got flustered easily). He wasn't sure how to celebrate, but teammates started rushing into him, he was pulled back into the sidelines smiling and laughing. Cristiano had assisted, but he wasn't around.

 

But that was because he wasn't sure what to do, it hadn't registered in his mind completely. What he knew was the he was making his way towards James, at least to congratulate, he had to be nice. 

 

And then, instead, he found himself in James' arms, his own wrapped up tightly around the other's torso, his forehead plastered to James'. It was all very sudden. He hadn't recounted what was happening until after and he ripped away quickly. Brushed his hair back and looked from under his eyelashes.

 

"Uh, sorry. Nice goal." He muttered nonchalantly and patted James' back. James nodded tinily, breathing hard and smiled. "Thanks." But Cristiano was already on his run back to his position.

 

~

 

Cristiano sauntered back himself after the last whistle, Sergio caught up to him.

 

"I measured and your noses were about 1 millimeter apart from touching."

 

Usually Cristiano would have a better comeback than the damned "Shut up." But today he didn't. Something made him dizzy after Sergio brought it up.

 

Sergio smirked again and patted his back. "It was a magical moment." And he ran off before Cristiano could retaliate but Cris had nothing to offer anyways.

 

~

 

This time Cristiano was in his underwear when James approached.

 

"Thank you, it was amazing." James muttered and he saw the muscles in Cristiano's back tense. Not that he was observing.

 

"Not a big deal." He discovered him and James had the same wardrobe on.

 

"Sorry you didn't get yours."

 

"Don't be."

 

And James smiled widely, looked to Cristiano's eyes for a second.

 

And look, James wasn't gay or anything, it was just a pure accident that his eyes scanned Cristiano's body from head to toe.

 

And Cristiano, Cris most definitely wasn't gay either, it was just this one time that he enjoyed it.

 

~

 

They ended up in training together again. Marcelo and Sergio made dumb noises and "cried" because their partner in crime had ditched them.

 

James reassured Cris multiple times that he didn't have to feel obliged to spend this time with James, honest.

 

"Yeah but I need a break from them." (And I really want to spend time with you). But he didn't mention that because it wasn't completely a truth in his conscious mind.

 

The only awkward (and best) part of the session was stretching. Because they were forced to grab their arms and their legs, waist and shoulders and each time they'd look at one another sheepishly and mumble a "sorry" or a "Ready?".

 

Ready was foolish to ask because both of them were ready, of course they were, but neither of them wanted to admit it to the other.

 

~

 

James took all that as an invitation to sit next to Cristiano on the bus. Cristiano allowed him gladly. 

 

"Nervous?" He asked because James shaking and James shrugged. 

 

"Don't worry yeah?" And he unconscionably slipped his arm around James' shoulders, it was probably uncomfortable but the other didn't dare move. He shut his eyes and smiled so Cristiano did the same.

 

~

 

They won against Atletico. Both James and Cris had scored and within the flurry of excitement they sought one another out and hugged for as long as possible.

 

"I told you don't worry," Cristiano whispered into James' ear after his goal, and his lips accidentally pulled themselves across the shell of it. James shivered and smiled, burrowing himself further into Cristiano's chest.

 

He was reluctant to pull away.

 

~

 

Sitting by one another in any situation became normal. At team dinners or team meetings or on the bus, even in the locker room. Cristiano's arm around James' waist and James' around the other's shoulders. It was always a little bit of an awkward situation because James' arms didn't reach completely, but they were together everywhere and neither of them noticed the jump they'd made.

 

And then Barcelona happened and they finally noticed the jump.

 

It was 1-1. They were going to tie. Going to fall back into the hole and everyone was giving up really, trying to convince themselves it was "better than a loss."

 

But Cristiano didn't want a tie. He hated them. So he shot and he shot and he shot as much as he possibly could but everything failed. It never worked.

 

And then it did. In the final seconds, and everything burst into smiles and laughter and screaming, so much so that he completely forgot who had assisted and where James was when they were celebrating.

 

But before walking into the locker room, James scurried up to him for the first time since the goal, pulled him aside. "You saved it. We're first because of you." And he smiled in such awe Cristiano didn't know what to say. Thank you seemed lame and I know was rude so he leaned down and kissed him.

 

James stiffened, wiped his lips off and looked at Cristiano whose eyes were wide as well.

 

He didn't offer anything though. Just ran off.

 

~

 

Cris was embarrassed. More than that he was mad because he actually believed he had the audacity to do that. What the fuck?

 

So he stayed away from James after that, was furious at himself and didn't have the urge to talk anymore. Whatever.

 

But James was surprised he was gone. And felt guilty. He never wanted to be rude, he was just- surprised. Like always. And he felt it was only right to make it up to Cristiano and apologize for this rudeness.

 

So when they were alone James came to Cristiano and pecked him back, quickly, swiftly and then lowered himself off the tips of his toes and waited. He didn’t know what for.

 

But Cristiano, he didn’t know how to react. He licked his lips and looked at James who was eagerly staring up at him smiling like a child. So he laughed. Mostly out of uncertainty and disbelief, but partially because James was so- cute. That was the word he’d never been able to find.

 

And James laughed too, a little confused on what had elicited the action. But Cristiano laughing was never an unfortunate thing.

 

And then Cristiano snorted and paused quickly. That was fucking embarrassing. He had ruined it. Though James started laughing harder and finally dug himself into Cristiano’s chest with a hug. Cristiano hugged back, head in his hair. There was one positive of James’ injury.

~

 

James was unsure after that if Cristiano was willing to show it off. Like yeah they kissed and held one another now, but he didn’t know his limits. If he was embarrassed or shy or unwilling. Whether it was too early or not ever.

 

But when they were sitting on the bus together again, like always, Cristiano slipped his hand down, opened it nonchalantly. James looked to him, thought maybe he wanted to say something but Cristiano just smiled.

 

So James grabbed it and wove his fingers with Cristiano's, and Cristiano tightened the grip as hard as he could.


End file.
